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Stalked: Megan Clinch, Emerging Lingerie Designer

20 July 2015

Lingerie is one of
those items which I always find I can justify spending the money on and I’ve
always been slightly obsessed with this particular (under) garment. I remember
my first internship was with the well known luxury lingerie shop Myla and there
was something I enjoyed about organising their huge press samples cupboard full
of sexy negligée and crotch-less panties!!

So for a while I’ve
been on the search for an emerging lingerie designer to get on the blog,
finally I found her at Graduate Fashion Week, please may I introduce, Megan
Clinch...

Why did you decide to
specialise in lingerie design?

I never even
considered doing lingerie before university, I knew I wanted to work in fashion
but had no idea what I wanted to specialise in. It wasn't until we started
learning about lingerie/swimwear in second year which led me to decide that is
what I wanted to do! I chose to create swimwear in my second year and then
moved into lingerie for the third and fourth years after interning at a lingerie
company in my placement year. I've really loved it ever since I started it in
second year, and am definitely glad I've chosen this path.

What techniques did
you use to create your graduation collection?

My graduate collection
is all very fragile, and delicate. I did not use typical lingerie fabrics as I
wanted to create very sheer looks whilst keeping it ethical. My whole
collection is about going against the fast-fashion, high street, ready-to-wear
garments we all purchase on a regular basis, so the creation of each of my
garments took a considerable amount of time with free-hand embroidery and
handmade straps and trims. I used simple shapes but made them my own with
different layering techniques and panels of free-hand embroidery, (this I did with
an embroidery hoop and a domestic machine.) The trims I created by spending
time experimenting with different stitches on the sewing machine, layering
different fabrics and distressing them in different ways to create unique
finishes.

What inspires you?

I am really passionate
about animals and raising awareness of human's over-consumption of everything
really. This is what had inspired my collection's embroidery patterns from
looking at the aftermath of pollution and different 'patterns' it leaves behind,
and I also studied into the effects the human lifestyle has on animals. The
delicacy of my designs were reflections of my research drawings of the delicate
animals being affected by pollution.

On the lighter side of things (you can often
sacrifice design quality in order to be ethical so I needed to ensure that my
collection was still aesthetically pleasing!) I also take a lot of inspiration
from what I see on social media and trend forecasting sites. There's so many
amazing lingerie companies out there making a name for themselves largely
through the power of social media, particularly Instagram. I follow pretty much
any lingerie company I can find on there and love seeing updates. Similarly I
also follow loads of illustrators and artists as this is something I'm big on
too, and more often than not my design inspiration will come from my
illustrations.

Where would you like
to see you're brand in 10 years time?

I would love to have
my own atelier/shop in London! The whole idea of my brand is everything is made
to measure so customers would place their order and receive it as soon as it
was made. With a shop it would be great to be able to have customers come in
for fittings and a great way for them to understand what the brand is all
about. I would class myself as an exclusive, high-end lingerie brand and would
love to be able to create a name for myself and be able to create one off
pieces for people that I admire!

What five items can
you not live without?

1- Black clothing!

2- Sunglasses, I'm literally
the most obsessed with sunglasses.

3- My iPod/
iPhone/Macbook (3 in one but I'm always attached to one of them)

4- My sewing machine!
It's special to me as my mum bought it for my for my 21st birthday present. For
years I was always trying to make things on her old singer (which is in dire
need of a service) and getting frustrated that it wouldn't work!

5- My little Jack
Russell, Tilly, not an item but I'm so obsessed with her, I just could not live
without her!